


A Great Secret in Him

by queeshmael



Category: The Art of Fielding - Chad Harbach
Genre: AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-21
Updated: 2013-11-21
Packaged: 2018-01-02 04:35:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1052589
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/queeshmael/pseuds/queeshmael
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Sophie saw Owen and Guert at the motel? Spoilers for the entire novel. Title from Moby Dick, by Herman Melville.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Great Secret in Him

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lonelywalker](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lonelywalker/gifts).



> For lonelywalker--thank you for the encouragement and brainstorming help! You'll noticed I used some of your dialogue verbatim because it was just that good!

Sophie Skrimshander turned up the music flowing through her headphones, attempting to drown out her dad’s complaints about his back, her mom’s complaints about night driving, and their argument over where to stay for the night, if anywhere. Sophie kept reminding herself that she liked her parents, despite the fact that they were annoying the crap out of her right now and sometimes they could be close-minded bigots. But other than that, they weren’t too bad.

The finally settled on a grungy looking motel fifty miles outside of Westish after her dad insisted they wouldn’t find anything better. As her parents unloaded their luggage from the car and started to set up their room, Sophie ducked outside the room to answer Henry’s phone call. She reassured him about tomorrow and update him on their whereabouts. She was happy to have her own bed at least.

As she hung up the phone and walked back outside, she noticed a thin form leaning against a silver car. She blinked a few times--there was something about that slenderness that was familiar to her. As her eyes adjusted to the darkness of the night, she noticed round-rimmed glasses, skin the color of weak coffee, and ashen hair.

“Owen?” she whispered to herself. She was just about to walk over to him to say hello, wondering what he was doing at this crummy motel when she saw him walk toward a door to a room that was held ajar. She looked toward the door and saw another form, this one much older, skin the color of mahogany with silver hair. That form looked familiar too, but it took her longer to place the face, since she’d only seen it in photographs and YouTube videos.

As soon as Owen started walking toward the door, she noticed her parents emerging from their room. Oh no, Sophie thought. Time to avert a crisis.

“I can get the rest of the luggage!” Sophie exclaimed to her parents, although Owen didn’t seem to hear her, or if he did, he didn’t recognize her voice. “You two just rest. I know you’re tired.” Her parents looked at her quizzically but did not protest, retreating back into the room. By this point, Owen had disappeared into the room with who Sophie thought was the president of Westish College.

That was...odd. There was only one reason for Owen and President Affenlight to be at a dingy motel. Despite her parents’ best efforts, Sophie was not ignorant of the ways of the world. Should she tell Henry about this? Maybe she should talk to Owen, before she told anyone else--just to make sure he was okay.  
\------------------------------------  
Sophie had never eaten in a restaurant as nice as Maison Robert, and certainly not with someone as beautiful and sophisticated as Pella Affenlight. Pella seemed to want to be anywhere but with Sophie and was in a rather sour mood, but she also seemed glad to have a captive audience for her musings.

“Sophie. Men are going to ruin your life,” Pella said as she poured Sophie her second glass of wine. Sophie could hardly believe her luck--her parents never let her have wine, and here she was, at a fancy restaurant acting like a real adult with someone who was a real adult. Westish was a magical place where she could be everything she wanted to be and couldn’t be at home in Lankton, South Dakota.

“They are?” Sophie asked, unsure of how she was supposed to respond to this comment.

“Yes. They are going to ruin your life with their fucked up problems. Fucked up men and their fucked up problems--the bane of a woman’s existence. The only cure for this is wine, so drink up,” Pella said, tapping Sophie’s glass. Sophie did as she was told. She wondered if Pella knew about her dad and Owen, but she didn’t feel comfortable bringing it up. She also sensed that some of Pella’s annoyance stemmed from having to ‘babysit’ Sophie, and in turn, Sophie felt annoyed and being treated like such a kid. In a year she’d be a college kid herself!

“Do you have a boyfriend?” Pella asked after the waiter brought their meals.

“No,” Sophie admitted, taking a bite of her chicken. It was the most delicious chicken she’d ever tasted, certainly better than anything her mom made at home. 

“Good. A boyfriend would just fuck up your life.” Sophie had guessed that Mike was Pella’s boyfriend and now suspected that something had made the relationship begin to turn sour. She didn’t feel that she knew her well enough to ask, and her usual effervescence was overshadowed by awe of the situation--the swanky restaurant and the wine and grown up Pella.

As her and Pella walked back toward Westish, Pella spotted a man walking towards them--tall, impossibly handsome, with blonde slicked-back hair and blue eyes, wearing a silver track jacket and dark blue sweatpants.

“You!” Pella suddenly yelled at him. He looked around, to make sure the “you” was directed at him, and approached them.

“You’re on the baseball team, aren’t you? Do you know where Henry’s family’s staying?” 

“Uh, yes?” the man said, looking at Pella and then Sophie. “You’re Henry’s little sister.” Sophie nodded wordlessly. “I can take her back to the hotel. I’m going that way anyway.”

“Great. I’m not feeling very well.” Pella abruptly ran off without so much as saying goodbye to either of them. Sophie wasn’t an idiot--she suspected that Pella was eager to be rid of her and find Mike. She slumped her shoulders and frowned, slowly becoming more miserable. So much for her fun night out with Henry and his cool Westish friends. Now she’d be stuck watching cable TV in the same room as her parents. She’d much rather be spending the evening with the man walking beside her, the most gorgeous man she’d ever seen, who was smiling down at her in a not unpleasant manner.

“I’m Adam,” he said, starting to walk, and Sophie followed him.

“Sophie,” she replied sullenly.

“You okay?” Adam asked.

“I’m fine. It’s just--Henry promised me that we’d go out tonight, so I wouldn’t have to spend the whole weekend with my parents.” 

“You haven’t done anything?”

“Nope,” Sophie said, shaking her head sadly. “Just dinner with Pella.”

“Huh. Well, how old are you?”

Sophie quickly decided that if there was a moment for her to lie about her age, this was it. “Eighteen?”

“Okay, how about we just swing by Bartleby’s for, like, half an hour? You’ve had a drink before, right?”

“Of course!” Sophie said. This time she wasn’t lying--the two glasses of wine at dinner, which was more than she’d ever drank before in her life, and she was already starting to feel very--relaxed. She concluded that this Adam fellow was a gift from God, in more ways than one. 

Adam rerouted their walk, asking questions about Sophie--where she went to school, where she was going to college, how she liked Westish so far--and soon they stood in front of a bar with a line of girls standing outside in flimsy, huddled two to a jacket, and guys in jeans and t-shirts or sometimes button downs, hands in their pockets, trying not to look cold. Adam walked up to the bouncer, said a few words to him, and opened the door for Sophie.

“Welcome to college” he said as Sophie stepped inside.  
\------------------------------------  
Sophie wasn’t exactly sure where Mike and Owen were taking her, but she was sad to leave Adam behind. She felt like she was moving in slow motion, and she also felt a bit dizzy. She was having so much fun at Bartleby’s! Why did Mike and Owen take her away?

“Can we go back and find Adam now?” Sophie said, conscious of the fact that her voice was louder than normal but unable to speak more quietly.

“You should not have been drinking! You are underage! And you definitely should not have been drinking with Adam. Adam is a shark, Sophie. You don’t want to be around sharks. Especially not drunk.” Mike said to her, avoiding answering her question.

“Strictly speaking, drinking ages are rather arbitrary,” Owen said, and Mike shot him a look that said, This is not the moment to be intellectual, Buddha. “But Michael is right. Adam might be a shark dreamboat, but he’s still a shark.”

“You’re one to talk!” Sophie slurred, poking a finger at Owen’s chest. “I saw you yesterday at a skanky motel with, like, a way older guy!”

Owen stopped walking, and since he was holding on to one of Sophie’s arms, Mike had to stop walking too. Mike looked over at Owen, whose eyes were wide, lips clamped together in a thin line. It was the only time he had seen the Buddha look so--disquieted. He was normally the picture of serenity.

“He kind of looked like the president. Weird, huh?” Sophie added with an amused smile.

“The president of the United States?” Mike asked, confused.

“The president of the college,” Owen whispered, so quietly that Mike had to strain to hear him.

“Affy? Affy’s gay? But...but Pella exists,” Mike exclaimed, unable to compute, certainly not while preoccupied with the whereabouts and well being of everyone on this campus. Well, everyone except Adam Starblind. Starblind could go fuck himself, as far as Mike was concerned.

Owen sighed. “It would behoove you to google the Kinsey scale sometime,” he said evenly. They had almost arrived at the Buick, when Mike’s phone began to ring.

“Don’t worry,” Sophie chimed in. “My parents didn’t see.” Owen breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

After Mike’s angry phone call with Pella, they began the short drive back to Small Quad, neither Mike nor Owen speaking except to discuss Henry’s possible whereabouts and what to do with Sophie for the evening. Upon entering Phumber, Owen offered to grab beer for him and Mike at a party, and then they put an already sleeping Sophie to bed under Henry’s blanket.

“Are you okay?” Mike asked Owen as Owen drank his beer and Mike unlaced Sophie’s complicated strappy sandals. “I mean, is your head okay?”

“My head is perfectly fine,” Owen said, eyes narrowing.

“I just want to make sure you’re okay. That you’re making rational decisions,” Mike replied, tossing Sophie’s sandals to the floor and picking up his own beer from Henry’s desk.

“Michael, you are acquainted with Guert. He’s Pella’s father. You admire his speeches and his Scotch collection.”

“Yeah, but I don’t know him that well, and maybe you don’t either, which is why I want to make sure you’re okay.”

Owen gave Mike a soft smile. “Thank you for the concern, but I assure you that I have full control over the situation.”

Of course he did, Mike thought. He’s the Buddha. He really needed to stop worrying about everyone at this goddamned school when he had enough to worry about with his problems and Henry’s disappearance. Mike downed the rest of his beer and curled up on Owen’s rug, only for a moment, he told himself. Just a brief rest before he’d go home to talk to Pella about whatever was bothering her.


End file.
